Zynga, the leading social gaming company on the web which created Mafia Wars and FarmVille, is exploring the introduction of new payment options such as game cards, internet banking and premium SMSes to crack open the Indian market.

Indian gamers can expect these new options by first half of 2011 although the company remained tight-lipped. Zynga, which employs around 100 people in India presently, sees huge monetisation opportunities in the second-fastest growing economy of the world, said Shan Kadavil, country manager, Zynga India. Zynga games are available on a number of global platforms including Facebook, MySpace, Yahoo, the iPad and iPhone.

According to recent numbers, Zynga has close to 270 million monthly active users and out of them around 3-5 per cent pay money to progress in their games. The privately-held company earns close to 90 cents of each dollar in revenue from virtual currency, which helps the social gamers take out-of-turn moves in their games.

For instance, several Zynga games require an ‘Energy’ characteristic to play, which may take several minutes to hours to replenish. For those who don’t want to wait for energy or other goods to replenish, credits can be purchased via credit cards, PayPal and game cards.

“We are considering a number of opportunities for India. The game cards route is the top contender since we have seen how retail cards have been utilised in the telecom (mobile) industry through points of purchases,” said Shan.